Two is Ridiculous

In his late-career novel ‘The Gods Themselves,’ Isaac Asimov mentions the ‘ridiculous’ idea of two universes — and two only — existing; that is, if more than one universe exists, then almost certainly infinite universes exist. So any ‘multiverse’ is probably an ‘infiniverse.’

That concept underlies the bulk of my fantasy novels, those that make up the Izan Cycle, but we have no way of knowing — and most likely never will — whether infinity actually exists or is purely a concept and things can be infinite only in potential. Of course, if infinity exists then god (in the broadest sense) would exist, and vice versa. God could be nothing less than infinite and that which is truly infinite must be god. But that’s getting off the subject.

And, again, impossible to prove one way or another (and likely to remain so). Other authors have explored multiverse ideas, some infinite, some not. Pratchett liked to play with the idea of everything existing somewhere. Others, such as Zelazny and Moorcock, set up a tension between two poles (chaos and order, heaven and hell, or whatever you might prefer) and a spread of worlds between them (which would be a constraint of sorts on infinite existence).

In my Izan novels, that tension is between being and non-being, existence and the void. And, of course, non-being doesn’t actually exist. I mean, there’s nothing there, right? But it is still possible to set up a struggle between the two, that which strives to exist and that which wishes to escape it (which is not possible, to be sure). ‘Good’ is that which serves existence — including, but not limited to, life.

Slipping into philosophical stuff there again, aren’t I? I probably wouldn’t write at all if I couldn’t tuck that sort of thing into the stories from time to time, though it is not my main motivation. There are much more mundane, more human, matters one can go on about. The ‘big’ questions may be safely left to lurk in the background. I just give them a nod of acknowledgment now and again.